St. Lucie elections office details changes for improvements

FILE PHOTO
Gertrude Walker (front), St. Lucie County Supervisor of Elections and Annie Clark, Administrative Assistant, work to verify the results of an Accuview optical scanner following a ballot recount at the Supervisor of Elections office in November.

Gertrude Walker

ST. LUCIE COUNTY — The St. Lucie County Supervisor of Elections office will count early votes before Election Day, keep track of ballots more uniformly and have firmer criteria for recounts, according to policy changes Gertrude Walker spelled out for the Florida Secretary of State this week.

Per the state's advice, Walker has detailed improvements areas where her team struggled this election — what to do when memory cards fail, how to store and account for all ballots, when to re-scan votes, where to eliminate redundancy and how to improve checks and balances. No one's job is in jeopardy, Walker has said. But three staffers have new titles, according to Walker's report.

The state Division of Elections audited Walker's office during November recounts and suggested changes in January. Walker told the state this week what she tweaked in her election security procedures to account for the state's suggestions. Walker couldn't be reached for comment Thursday.

Per the state audit's advice, Walker and her staff also will visit Hillsborough County's elections office later this month to get perspective from a bigger county with experience in elections with multiple-sheet ballots.

"Hillsborough County was selected as a large county that traditionally has multi-card ballots and because of their experience in 2010 General Election, in which they suffered failure of 13 memory cards on election night," Walker wrote in a letter to Secretary of State Ken Detzner.

Like St. Lucie, Hillsborough ran into snags with Dominion Voting Systems Inc. as its memory card supplier in 2010. Walker said Dominion didn't make up-to-date cards available this election. In response, Detzner has asked the Legislature to give his office more power to punish poorly performing vendors. Most of his other election reform ideas involve more early voting locations and days and limited length of ballot amendments.

Walker waited until Election Day to start counting early votes in 2012. She had expressed concerns about getting the results all tallied on time. After at least four memory cards holding early vote counts failed, workers then double counted or didn't count ballots, prompting a partial recount.

They also didn't initially account for a box of 306 ballots with write-in candidates. Walker's report spells out specifics about how to store and better track those ballots.

Detzner has suggested supervisors be required to upload early and absentee votes before Election Day. Right now, it's optional. Walker said she plans to count early votes before Election Day from now on, despite some reservations about results leaking.

"The uploading of early voting results into the election management system before Election Day is a concern because of the severe consequences of accidental untimely release of results; nevertheless, I have included this procedure in my plan," Walker wrote.

This cycle, Walker first ordered the partial recount, which occurred eight days after the election and only re-tallied ballots from three early voting days. The canvassing board then voted to order a full early voting recount in response to increased outcry from ex-congressman Allen West's legal team and supporters, and advice from a Division of Elections official on hand. West, R-Palm Beach Gardens, lost by about 2,000 votes to U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy, D-Jupiter.

After a partial recount and then a full recount of early ballots, St. Lucie's canvassing board ultimately missed its deadline to report updated results to the state by seconds. Interested parties from the Murphy and West camps scrutinized the process in court and during recounts.

Because of the missed deadline, older results that didn't reflect the recounts counted as final. Regardless, Murphy still would've won.

A voter advocacy group with tea party ties brought the fight back to the courts this week. True the Vote, a nonprofit that stems from a Texas Tea Party chapter, claims Walker's office denied them access to poll books, "voter credit" lists, felon files and other records. The federal lawsuit demands access to those records as public documents under the Florida Constitution and the National Voter Registration Act of 1993.

In the new policy notes, Walker requires her office to re-scan ballots muddled by memory card mishaps before reporting unofficial election night results.

The report also gets technical with contingency plans — what to do when memory card fail at the early voting polls; after early voting ends; on Election Day; or after reporting election night unofficial totals to the Division of Elections.